The Turning Tide
by Liave Ekeli
Summary: Sally Jackson sits alone on a beach after her uncle's funeral, contemplating her life and her future, when she, randomly and unexpectedly, encounters the man who will change everything.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer:** All Percy Jackson characters belong to Rick Riordan. No profit is being made from the publication of this story, and no copyright infringement is in any way intended.  
**Author's Note:** This fic happened rather randomly one night when I was sitting in front of my computer. I hadn't planned on writing any Percy Jackson fanfic before I'd finished reading the entire series, but then this just sort of happened - my take on how the very first encounter between Sally Jackson and Poseidon might have been. So, this is written with me only having read the first book, and I apologize in advance for any out-of-character-ness and inconsistencies with the later books. This is also my first PJ fanfic, so any reviews and con-crit are very much appreciated.

* * *

In the beauty of the ending day a young woman sat on a beach watching the never ending dance of the waves upon the shore. She was barefoot. Her shoes, a pair of black, sensibly high heels stood in the sand next to her, and one of them temporarily held the hair clip that had kept her hair from falling into her face during the funeral.

Now the funeral was over, and her uncle Teddy, at least what remained of him in the physical world, had been safely laid to rest. Sally Jackson was finally all alone.  
A soft breeze played with her long hair and dried the tears running down her cheeks. The grief from the funeral had dissipated a little, she had always known that Teddy would die, and lately she had felt so drained from caring for him that, quite frankly, his passing had been something of a relief. She would never admit that, of course. She wasn't the type to complain.

But now she looked out over the ocean and felt sad, contemplating her future. It wasn't looking too good; she was a high school drop out with no family, no connections, and no real prospects.

She sighed, and looked around the beach where she was sitting. It was dusk, and it was pretty quiet, just the way she liked it. There was a couple out walking their dogs, and she could see a father and his son flying a kite in the evening breeze some distance away, but other than that…  
Her eyes wandered from one end of the beach to the other and back, and suddenly a man she could not remember having seen before caught her eye.

She blinked, perplexed that she hadn't noticed him before, especially since he was not the kind of man to go unnoticed. He was tall and broad-shouldered, with black hair and tan skin, and even from a distance Sally could tell that he was a very attractive man. But there was something else that intrigued her too, apart from his looks, and that was the fact that he seemed to have walked straight out of the ocean. She could have sworn that he was dripping wet one moment and dry the next.

No, Sally thought to herself, that wasn't possible. She must have just missed him the first time her glance swept over the beach. It was getting dark, and her eyes were playing tricks on her, that was all. But oddly enough her mind didn't seem to settle for that explanation.

He was walking towards her now, and even though she tried to ignore him, she couldn't help but stare. Age-wise he looked to be in his mid-thirties, and he was dressed casually in dark blue shorts and a short-sleeved, white shirt with blue leaves printed on it. As she was watching him, she noticed something else, he was carrying something…something that looked remarkably like a…trident?

She blinked again, hard, trying to force her eyes to focus, convinced that she had to be seeing things that weren't there. Because Sally Jackson had seen some strange things in her life, but nothing like this; never a man walking around with a spear as if it was the most natural thing in the world. She opened her eyes again, and there was no denying it now – the man was definitely carrying a trident. When she realized that she really was seeing what she thought she couldn't help but chuckle, and mumbled to herself;

"What are _you_ fishing for…?"

Then, as he passed her, she smiled and shook her head slightly, looking out over the sea again. It was actually a little funny, now that she thought about it. Because…really, what was a guy doing walking around with a trident?

Only after a minute or so did it start to feel like someone was watching her, and when she looked around again she saw, to her horror, that the man had frozen in his steps a few paces away and was now looking wonderingly at her.

Their eyes met, and Sally found that she could not bring herself to look away, even if her heart was pounding furiously in her chest as he slowly changed direction and approached her.

Up close he seemed even more impressive than he had done from a distance. Not only attractive, but _powerful_ in a way she had never come across before. For the briefest of moments she was genuinely afraid, because his eyes seemed to flash with a force so strong it could rival the strongest and most forceful of waves, but then his eyes seemed to soften and she saw that they were the most striking, brilliant shade of green you could imagine. Involuntarily she thought that those were eyes she could easily get lost in.

"Did you say something?"

His voice when he spoke was pleasant, even a little hypnotic, but that too carried a hidden force, like it could just as easily sound like water crashing upon rocks.

"N-no…" Sally managed to stutter, before managing to retain some control of her own voice and adding;

"No…" She hesitated, and she saw that her answer didn't seem to please him. Thinking for a second that she might be in the process of doing something incredibly stupid, she decided to say what was really on her mind, and finished with;

"I was just wondering what you were planning to catch with that thing…"

She noticed, to her own annoyance that her voice trembled slightly as she finished the sentence. To clarify what she meant, she nodded towards the trident in his hand.

There was a pause, and Sally wondered if she should think about some kind of get-away plan, but then the stranger spoke, and for some reason his voice sounded genuinely surprised.

"You can see this?" He asked, gesturing slightly towards the three-pronged spear in his hand.

She shrugged, and dared to let a hint of a smile cross her lips as she replied;

"It's kind of hard to miss, don't you think?"

At this he smiled, and his eyes seemed to shimmer in the waning daylight. Without invitation he sat down in the sand beside her, and asked;

"What's your name?"

It was a simple enough question, but that didn't mean she was prepared for it, and for a moment she contemplated lying. After all, she had no idea who this man was or what his intentions were, but in the end she went with the truth and said quietly;

"Sally… Sally Jackson."

When she uttered her name he smiled again, suddenly seeming very pleased, and she couldn't help but notice how much nearer he seemed. The feeling of power was still there, but it seemed to be stilled by something else now, something that she couldn't quite put her finger on, but something that threatened to draw her in and consume her… And it felt so warm, so comforting and so pleasant that she thought that she would not mind much if it did.

"Well, Sally Jackson…" she heard his voice say,

"What else can you see?"


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer:** The characters of the _Percy Jackson and the Olympians _series are the property of Rick Riordan. No profit is being made from the publication of this story, and no copyright infringement is in any way intended.  
**Author's Note:**Wow! I did not expect to get so much feedback on this story. It was just a scene that came into my head one night and wouldn't leave until I wrote it down, and I had intended to just post it as a oneshot, for fun. But since some of you wondered where this was going, I started getting curious myself, so I decided it couldn't hurt to elaborate a bit. A note on the name used as a cover name by Poseidon - I thought it would just be silly for him to introduce himself as Poseidon to a girl he had just met, so I decided that I needed a more 'human' sounding name. I settled on Phillip Marinos, Phillip meaning 'friend of horses' (which felt right for Poseidon, seeing as he's the god of horses) and Marinos, which may be derived from Latin, meaning 'friend of the sea'. Oh, and this has not been beta-ed, so if you spot any mistakes or inconsistencies, please let me know so I can correct them. Hope you enjoy!

* * *

"What on earth do you mean?"

Sally frowned, and threw an uncertain glance around the beach. There was nothing there that could be described as anything out of the ordinary, except perhaps for the man now sitting beside her, the trident that had intrigued her now stuck in the sand next to him. So, she turned her eyes back to him, in an effort to try and see if he was perhaps joking…

He saw the uncertainty and confusion in her eyes, and smiled what he hoped was a suitably disarming smile, while he shrugged and replied;

"Nothing…"

There was a pause, and he let his glance travel out over the ocean, but he could feel that her eyes were still studying him.

"You didn't…tell me your name…"

She said, after a moment of silence. Her voice was still uncertain, but he easily picked up on the underlying curiosity she was probably trying to conceal. He had dealt with mortals for the better part of four thousand years now, so there were few of their phrases, tones and body language that he did not recognize. But whether he liked to admit it or not, every once in a while a mortal came along that still had the ability to surprise him.

"Phillip," He said to answer the question that hadn't really been shaped as a question.

"Phillip Marinos." He finished, turning his eyes back to meet hers.

She smiled now, and somewhat jokingly extended a hand to introduce herself. He completed the gesture, and marveled for a moment at the difference between their hands. Hers was small and slender, and felt remarkably soft, while his was large, coarse and scarred from millennia of ruling the sea.

Sally didn't seem to notice, and said;

"Marinos… that sounds Greek…?"

The named seemed to roll off her tongue, and she sounded a bit bolder now, but still kind of shy, like she wasn't sure what to do with his attention or how she should respond. This uncertainty just made her even more attractive in his eyes. He had met all kinds of women, both mortal and immortal, and still, as many as that numbered; he had only met a few who could carry both uncertainty and strength with such grace as he saw in the woman opposite him.

"Mm…it is. My family came here from Greece, many, many years ago…"

There was something resembling longing in his words, and Sally thought to herself that it sounded almost as if 'many years' meant 'thousands of years', and as if he was perhaps wanting to go back. Sally immediately felt a form of sympathy with that longing. She had long since lost count of all the times when she had desperately wished to be somewhere else, anyplace but where she was, the orphaned high school dropout who was stuck caring for an ailing uncle. The past nights, Uncle Teddy's final nights had been the hardest. Her uncle had been somewhere in-between worlds, temporary suspended somewhere in a twilight zone by high doses of strong pain medication, and she had sat by his bedside, largely un-needed, thinking. And the thoughts that came to her then were difficult to cope with alone, so to cope she dreamt…dreamt of what it would be like living the life of some other woman, somewhere else. To have an education and a job that you looked forward to going to in the mornings, someone to love, and someone to love you back… Perhaps it wasn't really the same as wanting to travel thousands of miles away, but the longing, that, she imagined, must feel similar.

A part of Sally desperately wanted to lose herself in the eyes of the mysterious stranger, but another part, she didn't know which… her sanity probably, held her back just as strongly. Something about the situation suddenly felt alien, and somewhat dangerous, so she did what she knew how to do; she looked for a way out.

"I- I should go…"

In a swift move that surprised him, she grabbed her shoes and stood, hurrying away without another word.

Even after four thousand years, there were still mortals who had the ability to surprise him.

* * *

Come Monday, Sally had almost managed to forget about her beach encounter with the mysterious fisherman. She had been forced too, as reality and work had caught up with her again. Being a waitress at Joe's Diner wasn't glamorous by a long shot, but the meager pay was just enough to pay the rent and buy enough spaghetti to last about a month. Everything else was luxury.

It was a regular Monday, with breakfast and dinner rushes, and Sally didn't really have time to think about anything but orders and refills until the dusk had already fallen outside, and the evening news had started running on the TV by the time she finally had time to sit down for more than two minutes.

Sally was sitting in the back, eating a well deserved portion of fries, when one of her colleagues, Lisa, came in.

"Hey, Sally…?"

"Yeah?"

"There's a guy out front asking for you…"

Just as Lisa finished, another colleague, Amy, poked her head through the door, and chimed in with a conspiratory whisper;

"There is this _unbelievably _good-looking guy out front…"

"We know," Lisa said, before continuing;

"He's here for Sally, apparently."

Amy's eyes widened in surprise. That was probably because she was used to any gentlemen callers being there for her. Amy was the wannabe model who worked as a waitress while waiting for her big break, tall and thin with long blond hair and brown eyes. She was also a flirt, but at least she was good enough to admit it herself. Sally suspected that she rather enjoyed playing the part.

"Where did you find him?!?" Amy demanded, to which Lisa responded sarcastically;

"How is she supposed to know that when she doesn't even know who it is yet?"

Amy seemed perplexed at that for a moment, before she waved Sally enthusiastically out through the door which she was now holding open.

"Well… go find out! Right now! I want to know if he has a brother…"

Sally eyed both of them, still skeptic. She had become suddenly suspicious about who it might be, and if she turned out to be right she wasn't sure if she actually wanted to see him. And how the hell had he managed to find out where she worked?!?

Carefully, she made her way through the kitchen and out behind the counter of the restaurant. Sure enough, it didn't take her long to spot him and conclude that whatever it was that had attracted her to him that evening on the beach was still there. She just wasn't confident that was a good thing.

It didn't take long for him to notice her; her reddish-brown hair and clear blue eyes shone, even against the drab waitress uniform. When he saw her approach him, those eyes a mix of wonder and anger, he began to question if he had made a wise decision in coming there. She reminded him of something like a nymph, but somehow stronger, not as fleeting. He caught himself thinking that if she had been one of the Olympians she would have been a mighty one, indeed.

"Hi" He began carefully, when she came within speaking distance.

"…Hi" She replied, sounding cautious. He had to remind himself that she had every right to be. New York wasn't the safest of cities, and he must appear like a stalker to her… a good one at that. She had not given him anything that could help find out where she worked, and yet he was here.

"I'm sorry to just show up like this… I know how it looks…"

"How… how did you find me?" She asked softly.

He shrugged.

"Coincidence. I was telling a friend of mine about this beautiful woman I met at the beach, and he said it sounded like a waitress at a diner he knew of…"

She frowned, obviously wondering whether or not to believe him. He smiled what he hoped was a casual, harmless smile, and brought the best twinkle to his eye he knew how to conjure.

She closed her eyes for a moment and sighed, before asking;

"What do you _want_?"

He shrugged, trying to make it seem like he was just thinking something up on the spot.

"Take you out?"

She shook her head slightly, and bit her lip, thinking.

"I don't get off until ten." Sally replied hesitantly.

"I can wait…" He answered, his smile broadening.


End file.
